Julia Caples, 45, has been
sucking the blood of willing donors for more than 30 years.
She meets fellow vampire
enthusiasts at a local occult and oddities store where she cuts them with a
pagan-style knife before lapping up their blood
She believes it keeps her
young and vigorous, just like the ageless bloodsuckers from movies such as
Twilight.
The blood-thirsty care
worker claims there is a huge sub-culture of blood drinkers across the world.
But she is trying to keep
her strange hobby away from son Alexi, 11. And daughter Ariel, 24, hates her
mum’s obsession – urging her to stop
Julia, from Wilkes Barre,
Pennsylvania, US, said: “When I feed off of a person and drink their blood I
feel stronger and healthier.
“I know scientifically
there’s not a lot of nutrition in blood, but maybe there’s some value we
haven’t discovered yet.
“I feel more beautiful than
any other time when I’m regularly drinking.
“I’m also extremely healthy
with no major health problems, and I have an abundance of energy all the time.
“At times I’ve drunk
half-a-gallon a month.”
Julia’s fascination with
blood began as a young girl, during her first kiss as a teenager, when she got
the urge to bite her sweetheart.
She said: “It was my natural
instinct and I liked the taste. I just got an urge and can’t really explain it.
It’s never gone away.
“Needless to say though, he
never kissed me again.”
But Julia did not start
drinking blood regularly until she met her now ex-husband Donald, 49.
Counsellor Donald and Julia
got married in a vampire-themed wedding in October 2000 and even drank from
each other to celebrate.
The pair became part of a
sub-culture of vamp fans who visited New York nightclubs and drink from each
other.
But when the pair had son
Alexi, Donald vowed never to drink again.
He said: “I gave up, so
Julia didn’t have to. We agreed that one of us would need to stop and focus on
parenting full time.
“Julia still likes to drink,
but she’s also an amazing mother, and her children come first. She’d never let
it stop her mothering her kids.”
Despite his mum’s efforts to
keep her lifestyle secret from him, Alexi is beginning to suspect his mum’s
ghoulish ways.
He said: “We have all these
decorations at home like coffins and dolls. I’m starting to think she’s a
vampire.”
And Ariel said: “I think she
runs a lot of health risks. I worry she might get a disease from someone
through the blood.”
Julia, who blogs about
vampirism using her online persona Lady DarkRose, says she’s aware of the
health dangers, but all her donors are tested before she’ll drink from them.
She added: “I meet some
donors online but I absolutely have to meet them in person first.
“And they have to get blood tests to make sure
that they’re not carrying any blood-borne diseases like AIDS or HIV".
Haematologist Steven
Gruenstein, from the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, said:
“There are risks involved.
HIV, hepatitis and other viral and bacterial illnesses can be transmitted
through blood, so though these risks are not large, they are real and it would
be an unnecessary danger.
“Blood does contain
chemicals like salt, iron, protein, and people might be driven to drink it
because of a deficiency of iron or some other chemical.”
He added: “There has been a
resurgence of cult drinking blood vampirism in this country and throughout the
world, possibly down to all these TV shows and movies that have become so
popular.”
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